Monday, May 31, 2010

HAVANA (Reuters) – The Cuban government has not yet improved conditions for political prisoners or released any as had been hoped after recent talks between Catholic Church leaders and President Raul Castro, Cuba's "Ladies in White" dissident group said Sunday.

Speaking to reporters after the group's traditional Sunday march protesting the 2003 imprisonment of their loved ones, leader Laura Pollan said they had heard nothing from the government about its plans.

"Here, nothing is known. Everything is a state secret," said Pollan, whose husband, dissident Hector Maseda, is serving a 20-year prison sentence.

Catholic officials said Castro promised in a May 19 meeting with Cardinal Jaime Ortega to move prisoners soon to jails closer to home or, if they were sick, into hospitals.

According to some reports, he also signaled the possible release of an unknown number of prisoners.

So far, Pollan said, the only thing certain is that no prisoners have been moved or released.

"Everything is speculative; there is not thing concrete," she said.

The Ladies in White have staged weekly protest marches since the March 2003 arrest of 75 dissidents, many of whom are their husbands or sons and most still behind bars.

After Sunday's march by 33 white-clad women, Pollan told them it was important for them and their imprisoned family members, particularly those who are ill, to remain calm while waiting for the promised changes.

"Anxiety can produce strong stress and we don't want them to get sicker," she told the women.

At least 26 of the prisoners are said to be in ill health. Former prisoner Guillermo Farinas has been on a hunger strike for more than three months demanding their release.

His hunger strike followed the February 23 death of hunger striking prisoner Orlando Zapata Tamayo, which prompted international condemnation of Cuban human rights.

In April, the Cuban government tried to stop the women from staging their Sunday marches and brought in pro-government counter protesters to harass them.

But Ortega intervened, and officials allowed the marches to go on, at least for now.

Human rights advocates say Cuba has about 190 political prisoners in all. The Cuban government views them as mercenaries working for the United States and other enemies.

CARACAS, Venezuela — It's no longer just doctors, nurses and teachers. Cuba now sends Venezuela troops to train its military, and computer experts to work on its passport and identification-card systems.

Critics fear that what is portrayed by both countries as a friendship committed to countering U.S. influence in the region is in fact growing into far more. They see a seasoned authoritarian government helping President Hugo Chavez to protect his power through Cuban-style controls, in exchange for oil. The Cuban government routinely spies on dissidents and maintains tight controls on information and travel.

Cubans are involved in Venezuelan defence and communications systems to the point that they would know how to run both in a crisis, said Antonio Rivero, a former brigadier general whose break with Chavez over the issue has grabbed national attention.

"They've crossed a line," Rivero said in a May interview. "They've gone beyond what should be permitted and what an alliance should be."

Cuban officials dismiss claims of outsized influence, saying their focus is social programs. Chavez recently scolded a Venezuelan reporter on live television for asking what the Cubans are doing in the military.

"Cuba helps us modestly with some things that I'm not going to detail," Chavez said. "Everything Cuba does for Venezuela is to strengthen the homeland, which belongs to them as well."

But the communist government has a strong interest in securing the status quo because Venezuela is the island's principal economic benefactor, Rivero says.

As Cuba struggles with economic troubles, including shortages of food and other basics, $7 billion in annual trade with Venezuela has provided a key boost — especially more than 100,000 barrels of oil Chavez's government sends each day in exchange for services.

Rivero, who retired early in protest and now plans to run for a seat in the National Assembly, said Cuban officers have sat in high-level meetings, trained snipers, gained detailed knowledge of communications and advised the military on underground bunkers built to store and conceal weapons.

"They know which weapons they have in Venezuela that they could count on at any given time," he said.

Cuban advisers also have been helping with a digital radio communications system for security forces, meaning they have sensitive information on antenna locations and radio frequencies, Rivero said.

If Chavez were to lose elections in 2012 or be forced out of office — like he was during a brief 2002 coup — it's even feasible the Cubans could "become part of a guerrilla force," Rivero said. "They know where our weapons are, they know where our command offices are, they know where our vital areas of communications are."

Chavez has acknowledged that Cuban troops are teaching his soldiers how to repair radios in tanks and to store ammunition, among other tasks. No one complained years ago, he added, when Venezuela received such technical support from the U.S. military.

Cuba and Venezuela are so unified that they are practically "one single nation," says Chavez, who often visits his mentor Fidel Castro in Havana and sometimes flies on a Cuban jet.

The countries plan to link up physically next year with an undersea telecommunications cable. The Venezuelans are even getting advice from President Raul Castro's daughter Mariela Castro, who heads Cuba's National Sex Education Center and advocated civil unions for homosexuals during a recent seminar in Caracas.

Some Venezuelans mockingly call it "Venecuba." When the government took over the farm of former Venezuelan U.N. ambassador Diego Arria, he contested the seizure by delivering his ownership documents to the Cuban Embassy, saying the Cubans are in charge and "much more organized than the Venezuelan regime."

"No self-respecting country can place such delicate areas of the government as national security in the hands of officials of another country," said Teodoro Petkoff, an opposition leader who is editor of the newspaper Tal Cual. "President Chavez doesn't trust his own people very much. So he wants to count on the know-how and time-tested experience of a government that for 50 years has been carrying out a brutal and totalitarian dictatorship."

Cuban government officials, however, say the bulk of their assistance is in public services.

At the National Genetic Medicine Center in Guarenas, east of Caracas, Cuban doctors and lab technicians diagnose and treat genetic illnesses.

"What we came to do is science," said Dr. Reinaldo Menendez, the Cuban director of the centre, which also employs Venezuelans. "Our weapons... are our minds, our work, our coats, our stethoscopes.

"We're internationalists by conviction," he added, passing photos of Chavez and Fidel Castro on the walls.

Cuban Deputy Health Minister Joaquin Garcia Salavarria co-ordinates missions involving more than 30,000 doctors, nurses, and other specialists from the island. He estimated that about 95 per cent of the approximately 40,000 Cubans in Venezuela work in medical, education, sports and cultural programs, and that others are helping as advisers on everything from agriculture to software for the state telephone company, CANTV.

As he spoke, Garcia flipped through a file of statistics that he said show the real impact of the Cuban presence: more than 408 million consultations in neighbourhood health clinics since 2003. That's an average of 14 medical visits for each of Venezuela's more than 28 million people.

Many Venezuelans are grateful for the free medical care provided by the Cubans, and waiting rooms are often bustling. Still, polls have repeatedly shown a large majority of Venezuelans don't want their country to adopt a system like Cuba's.

Chavez says he's not copying Cuba's socialist system but has adopted some practices, like creating a civilian militia to defend his government. When he founded a fledgling national police force last year, Chavez boasted that "we're going to compete with the Cuban police force, which is among the best in the world."

A senior Cuban police official, Rosa Campoalegre, has been in Caracas to help with plans for a new university for police and other security officials. She declined a request to be interviewed.

Cuban experts have also been working on systems in public registries and notaries. About 12 Cuban computer specialists from the University of Computer Science in Havana have been creating software to help the immigration agency improve passport control and computerize the identification card system, director Dante Rivas said.

"There's nothing to hide here," Rivas said. "What they do is develop the software, jointly with us, but we operate it exclusively. That's all. They don't do anything else."

In Cuba, he said, the government uses a different system.

The island's computerized civil registry includes all relevant data on its citizens, such as address, age and physical characteristics. All Cubans must carry an identity card, and those who want to travel outside the country must get special permission.

It's especially worrying that Cubans are involved in areas "that have to do with control of information, people's private information," said Rocio San Miguel, who heads a Venezuelan organization that monitors security and defence issues.

Chavez, meanwhile, says Cuba's assistance is worth "10 times more than the cost of the oil we send."

He has effusively thanked Cuba for helping Venezuela to revamp its electrical system — a move ridiculed by Chavez's opponents due to Cuba's own struggles with power outages. Chavez also credited a Cuban cloud-seeding program with helping to bring an earlier rainy season this year after a severe drought.

HAVANA -- Dissidents and relatives of Cuban political prisoners said Monday that they've seen no improvement in conditions for inmates despite an apparent government agreement to improve life behind bars for the island's 200 political prisoners.

The Roman Catholic Church said the government agreed to move many of those considered "prisoners of conscience" by international human rights groups to prisons closer to their homes, and some ailing inmates are to be sent to hospitals for long-demanded treatment.

But interviews by The Associated Press with six dissidents, relatives and human rights leaders show disappointment at the early results of the reported breakthrough - which was to have gotten under way last week.

"There has been no movement whatsoever," said Elizardo Sanchez, head of the independent Havana-based Commission on Human Rights and National Reconciliation, which monitors treatment of dissidents and would be among the first to hear of prison transfers.

Anxious family members said they still held out hope the government would keep its word, but some were clearly beginning to lose patience.

"I spoke to (my husband) on Wednesday," said Lidia Lima, the wife of one of Cuba's oldest political prisoners, 68-year-old Arnaldo Ramos. "He was so hopeful, but now we're not so sure."

What seemed to be a landmark accord on the political prisoners came amid growing signs that Cuba was ready to soften its stance on the opposition, and that the church would play a leading role.

Then, on May 19, Cuban President Raul Castro held a four-hour meeting with the cardinal and another church leader. Ortega a said he saw the encounter as a "magnificent start."

Three days later, Havana auxiliary bishop Juan de Dios Hernandez brought news of the prisoner transfer agreement to hunger-striking dissident Guillermo Farinas, who told AP that the transfers would start May 24.

Orlando Marquez, a Havana church official, told AP on May 23 that the transfers would begin over the course of last week.

The church had no comment Monday on the reason for the lack of movement, but a church official said privately the government had promised only to start the paperwork last week and gave no specific date on when prison transfers or releases might begin. The official spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity surrounding the agreement.

Ramos, a Havana native, is serving an 18-year prison term at the high-security Sancti Spiritus jail in eastern Cuba, 220 miles (350 kilometers) from his home. He is one of 75 people locked up in a sweeping 2003 crackdown on activists, community organizers and human rights leaders. More than 50 are still in jail.

Laura Pollan, the leader of the Damas de Blanco - or Ladies in White - told the AP that at least 17 prisoners of the original 75 are being held at jails outside their home province, 11 were older than 60, and 26 suffered serious health problems.

She said she was particularly concerned for four prisoners who met all of those criteria: Ramos, Adolfo Fernandez, Jesus Mustafa and Omar Ruiz. She said she still had faith change was coming.

"I believe in God. Hope is the last thing one loses," she said. "I am an optimist."

Pollan's husband, Hector Maseda, 65, was among those arrested in 2003 and is serving a 20-year prison sentence in the central province of Villa Clara. He could be a candidate for improved conditions or transfer closer to Pollan in Havana, but she said his situation hasn't changed.

The government had no immediate comment on Monday, nor has it commented publicly on the agreement reached with the church. Cuban officials describe the dissidents as traitors paid by Washington to undermine its communist system. They say their human rights record is among the best in the world.

One dissident's wife, Bertha Soler, told the AP her nerves have been frayed by all the waiting.

"It's already been a week," she said. "I am getting a little desperate."

Her husband Angel Moya is serving a 20-year prison sentence.

Sanchez, the human rights leader, said he was still hopeful the prisoner releases would take place, because the government had clearly made a political decision to make the concessions.

"We must wait without stress," he said. "Sooner or later it will happen, but this is a government that will take all the time it likes."

INDEPENDENT JOURNALIST ARRESTED AGAIN, 10 DAYS AFTER BEING RELEASED31-05-2010.Reporters Without Borders

(www.miscelaneasdecuba.net).- Calixto Ramón Martínez Arias, an independent journalist who works for Hablemos Press, was arrested again by State Security officials while covering a dissident demonstration in Havana on 25 May. Another independent journalist, Carlos Serpa Maceira, and six other demonstrators were also arrested but, unlike Martínez, they were quickly released.

Martínez was due to be transferred to Camagüey the day after his arrest but his present place of detention is not known. He had been released on 14 May after being held for three weeks in Valle Grande prison on a charge of "aggravated insult" at the time of his arrest by police on 23 April. (http://en.rsf.org/cuba-authorities-imprison-one-27-04-2010,37163.html)

Reporters Without Borders is also concerned about the health of three journalists who have been held since the "Black Spring" crackdown of March 2003, when they were convicted on trumped-up charges of spying. They are Normando Hernández González (sentenced to 25 years in prison), José Luis García Paneque (24 years) and Juan Carlos Herrera Acosta (20 years).

What became of the humanitarian gesture that the Cuban government promised as a result of the Catholic Church's mediation?

Sunday, May 30, 2010

The Cuban singer who was run over by a subway train in Madrid on Monday, Danays Bautista, has had her "left arm amputated again" today after a laborious operation to reimplant it on Wednesday.

An obstruction was detected in one of the veins in her arm after it had been re-attached to her body.

According to a spokesperson for the Hospital General Universitario Gregorio Marañón, where the delicate operation took place, Bautista has had to have the arm removed again and is "in a critical condition" in intensive care.

The singer is "sedated and on an artificial ventilator" and has "received a large blood transfusion" in the past few hours.

Bautista's condition continues to be "serious" according to the hospital.

The singer, who is blind, fell between two carriages of a subway train in the Nueva Numancia station in Madrid on Monday and was run over, losing her left arm in the accident.

A painting blending surrealism and a Cuban form of voodoo was the top selling work at Sotheby's Latin American art sale, setting an auction record for artist Wifredo Lam.

"Sur Les Traces (Transformation)" fetched $1.42 million but the Thursday night sale, which totaled $12.2 million, fell below the $13.8 million minimum pre-sale estimate. It also failed to match Sotheby's $14.6 million Latin American auction last fall.

"The big trend that I saw was that the surrealist works did very well, the other one was abstract art," said Sotheby's Latin American art chief Carmen Melian.

Lam painted "Sur Les Traces" after he returned to Cuba from Paris, where he belonged to the surrealist group led by Andre Breton.

"This work combines European elements of surrealism and of santeria," said Melian.

Like Haiti's voodoo, santeria mixes Roman Catholicism and West African religious traditions. Lam's grandmother was a santeria priestess, she added.

Horsetails, horns and flames evoke santeria in a dreamlike setting where fluid black strokes trace silhouettes of human extremities like eyes and fingers.

At $722,500, the second-best seller was "The Ordeal of Orwain," by Mexican surrealist Leonora Carrington. The 1959 painting portrays a Druid-like sacrifice of a legendary Welsh noble; a priestess with a cat-like face stirs a caldron.

A 1951 untitled work by Chilean surrealist Matta was another top seller at $692,500.

Mexican Diego Rivera's "Portrait of Gladys March" went to a North American private collector for $662,500. March was an American journalist who spent six months interviewing Rivera and the ghost writer of his autobiography.

The sale lot includes her notes and manuscript, which Melian called "a scholar's paradise," running to hundreds of pages packed in four boxes.

It also included a Rivera letter in which he describes March as a mischievous girl who grew to be a "pretty young woman."

Rivera's 1953 "Tejedora y los Ninos", or "Weaver and Children," valued at up to $1.3 million, failed to sell. For more than half a century it was only known to scholars via a grainy black and white photograph before resurfacing for sale.

Mexican cultural laws barred the work being taken abroad.

"That strongly affected the price because it really narrowed down the public (for it) ," said Melian.

The Sotheby's sale followed Christie's two-day Latin American auction, which sold $20.5 million and set 12 artist auction records. It sale ranked as its best auction in two years.

Framed as a religious votive offering, it symbolizes her gratitude for surviving a suicide attempt and features a pre-Hispanic idol, according to Christie's. Kahlo had separated from Rivera after discovering his affair with her sister.

The largest island in the Caribbean is finally opening its doors to investmentBy Laura LathamWednesday, 22 July 2009

For a communist country, Cuba has marketed itself pretty well over the years. It's almost impossible to hear the island's name without thinking of white rum, cigars, salsa, Ernest Hemingway and streets lined with battered 1950s American cars.

It's also done a pretty good job with tourism. After decades of isolation, the government began promoting the island's beaches and stunning crumbling capital city, Havana, to international visitors around 15 years ago. And despite concerns over its human rights record, it has become one of the most popular destinations in the Caribbean, with over two million visitors each year.

The island's communist status, along with the trade restrictions imposed by the US government since 1959, have prevented large-scale investment by overseas companies. However, that may be about to change. One of the first things President Obama did on taking office this year was to signal a thaw in relations with Cuba.

Change has come to the country; private holiday homes are on sale to foreign buyers for the first time in 50 years, Cuban exiles can now travel freely from the US to visit their former home, and trade and investment restrictions are expected to be reviewed. Such moves will undoubtedly spark a rush from developers to buy up Havana's colonial-style buildings and beautiful beachfront plots for hotels, apartments and holiday resorts.

The first of these is already underway. British company Esencia is building a residential golf development, The Carbonera Club, in the Varadero region. "Cuba is a wonderful country with great cultural significance and potential," says chief executive Andrew Macdonald. "We didn't base our business projections on America relaxing restrictions, but it's an important step and makes it an exciting time to be in Cuba."

It's taken Macdonald six years to get permission for the project, but he is seeing interest from investors all over the world. Hollywood superstar Jude Law, pictured, has reportedly fallen in love with Cuba, and plans to buy in the new development. "Ours is the first residential resort sanctioned by the government and offers a mix of golf, sailing and access to the best beaches in Cuba," Macdonald says.

The project will offer around 900 apartments and villas, with design input from Sir Terence Conran, plus a PGA golf course, hotel, spa and marina. Apartments start at £77,500 and rise to £1.1m for villas, but this doesn't get you the freehold. "Foreigners can only lease property for 75 years, but I expect the law to change in time," says Macdonald, who believes his will be the first in a wave of residential projects should the political situation alter.

That could be a slow and difficult process, according to Ian Taylor MP, chairman of the Cuba Initiative, a non-governmental body set up to facilitate British investment in Cuba. "Cuba is complicated, but there have been a lot of changes since the 1990s," he says. "It's inevitable that tourism is one of the first areas of growth and investment."

Taylor admits there are issues with property ownership, and that the conditions of infrastructure are poor, especially the roads and rail network, but he says the Cuban government is keen to encourage foreign finance and that things will improve.

"Cuba has enormous potential and will be attractive to investors if it does open up, but you can't make any assumptions that the political system will change. Any investment needs to be made within the context of the Cuban government."

Cuba: Buyer's guide

* Private property ownership in Cuba is prohibited, people have the right to swap homes but not to buy or sell.

* Non-nationals can only own designated property via non-renewable, 75-year leases. Ownership and residency issues are complex, so don't be tempted to buy private homes.

* Cuba is in the centre of the hurricane belt and has been badly hit several times in the past few years.

* The political situation is still uncertain, so this is not an investment for a novice or the risk averse.

For spiriting players out of Cuba into the major leagues, Juan Ignacio Hernandez Nodar spent 13 years in a Cuban prison. It wasn't until last November that he was set free. Host Scott Simon talks to Hernández, who endured solitary confinement and death threats and even tried to take his own life.

SCOTT SIMON, host:

Juan Ignacio Hernandez Nodar, an American citizen who spent most of his life in Miami, embarked on a dangerous career path in the mid-1990s. His chosen profession landed him in a Cuban prison for 13 years. He endured solitary confinement, death threats and a nervous breakdown. He tried to take his own life. Wasn't until last November that he was set free.

Juan Hernandez Nodar is a baseball scout. Mr. Hernandez Nodar's crime: signing ballplayers, including pitcher Livan Hernandez, who's now with the Washington Nationals, and spiriting them out of Cuba for life in the Major Leagues.

Mr. Hernandez Nodar was scouting Livan Hernandez's half-brother, the star pitcher Orlando El Duque Hernandez, when he was arrested at a ballgame in Cuba in 1996. He was sentenced to 15 years in prison and was finally released last year.

Juan Hernandez Nodar joins us from member station WLRN in Miami.

Thanks so much for being with us.

Mr. JUAN IGNACIO HERNANDEZ NODAR (Baseball Agent): My pleasure, sir.

SIMON: First, how are you doing?

Mr. NODAR: Well, I'm doing fine. What can I tell you? I've been here almost six months already since I came back from Cuba, and a lot of things have been changed for me.

SIMON: Yeah. Well, could I get you to cast back to that day, August 1996, when you were arrested?

Mr. NODAR: Yes, sir. That day I left Miami was August the 10th of '96. I arrived in Havana around 11:00 that night. I rent a car and I drove to my family in the town named San Nicolas. And from there, the next day we keep traveling to all the way to Santi Espiritu. The youth tournament of baseball was taking place that week. And next day I got arrested at noon.

When the game between the United States of America and Venezuela finished, I got arrested. And three days later, I (unintelligible) find out, I was arrested in the charge that I was helping the Cuban defectors that left Cuba on the past month.

SIMON: May I ask, I mean now that you're safely out, were you?

Mr. NODAR: Were I?

SIMON: Were you guilty of that charge? I mean maybe it's an unjust law, but were you in fact...

Mr. NODAR: Let me tell you. I don't think it's any guilty at all, because all those players - Livan, Vladimir Nunez, Larry Rodriquez, Osvaldo Fernandez, which are the players I took charge of them - they left Cuba with a visa to enter the country to play tournaments. When they were there they decide to stay. There's nothing illegal of that. Because you decide to establish your residence over there, that's completely legal. So I believe they wrong with me.

SIMON: Mr. Hernandez Nodar, what was it like in prison for you?

Mr. NODAR: Well, I'll be honest with you. Prison in Cuba is awful because - let me put it to you this way. At the beginning, I was in a cell that the capacity of that cell was 36 persons and there were 82 of us in there. We were sleeping in the bathroom, in the floors. Every place we could find a little spot at night, we laid down over there and sleep.

And the food over there was awful. At the beginning I lost 63 pounds in less than four months due to not having to eat that type of thing. And believe me, it was awful. Awful.

SIMON: You were put in solitary confinement...

Mr. NODAR: Yeah, I was put in solitary in 2000 when the United States baseball team win the Olympics down in Sydney. I was very happy for that and the guard in the floor that I was grabbed me and put in solitary, because I was happy because the United States of America won the Olympics.

And I told him, hey, guy, I'm a U.S. citizen and I'm proud to be a U.S. citizen. I'm happy for my country. In the same way every time Cuba wins, you people get happy, I should get happy. We don't care about that. You don't suppose to cheer because the United States wins. It's something, you know, stupid things that if you analyze, they don't have to be like that.

There was a time that the prisoner warden told me, Juan, don't say anything else because you belong to Mr. Fidel Castro. You are his personal prisoner and nobody except him will allow you to do something.

SIMON: I gather you're in the D.R., the Dominican Republic now, right?

Mr. NODAR: Yes, sir. Since I come back, I went back to D.R., where I got most of my family. And I opened a baseball training camp over there, which the main thing is grab the young Dominican talents who are from 15 to 16 years old and practice them over there, feed them. We got room and board facility where we keep them over there. We teach them the language of English, we're giving classes, and we practice every day. We try to get them to sign with a major league team.

And most of those kids come from the streets and from the valleys and from the country, you know, that they decide not to go to school no more and start playing ball, because they think playing baseball is a future for them and their families.

SIMON: I'm assuming that perhaps only a small percentage of people at your academy actually make it into the major leagues.

Mr. NODAR: Right now we got 22 kids.

SIMON: Yeah.

Mr. NODAR: And out of those 22 kids, I got three of them that baseball teams are interested on them, which they already given them tryouts and stuff like that. And if everything goes right, they should be signed by the end of the month of June or at the beginning of July.

SIMON: Which raises the question: What happens to the 19 kids who aren't signed? Are there lives better cause they were at your academy?

Mr. NODAR: Well, in the period they're in our academy, we try to keep them there, like I said, for a year. If we don't see that the kid's going to make it, we go straight to him and tell him, look, this is not for you, we recommend you to go back to school. And we even help them to go back to school.

SIMON: Are you still in a position or have any interest in helping Cuban ballplayers?

Mr. NODAR: All the time, sir. Any Cubans that would like to approach to me, my hands, my heart will be open for them, and I'll be more than glad to help them.

SIMON: Well, Juan Ignacio Hernandez Nodar, baseball scout, joining us from WLRN in Miami, thanks so much for being with us.

HAVANA, May 28 (Reuters) - Red flags went up on beaches in western Cuban this week, closing them briefly to swimmers amid rumors that the BP oil spill in the U.S. part of the Gulf of Mexico was forcing sharks into Cuban waters.

The government, through state-run press, quickly denounced the rumors as false and the beaches were reopened, but the incident reflected fears that the massive spill will reach Cuba and wreak havoc on an island still relatively untouched by modernity's environmental ills.

"Cuba, like all the countries in this area, is worried about the situation in the Gulf," said Osmani Borrego Fernandez, a director at the Guanahacabibes National Park at Cuba's western tip.

So far, he said, there has been no evidence of the oil, but "we are alert."

A trip along Cuba's coastline is like a trip back in time where vast stretches of palm-fringed beaches sit undeveloped and sea life abounds in the crystalline waters.

While rampant development and overfishing have damaged coastlines and depleted seas around the world, communist-led Cuba has been largely preserved by its slow economic pace.

As a result, scientists and environmentalists view Cuban waters as a place where they can see how the world's oceans were decades ago.

"Many areas along the coast, and thousands of small keys, are in rural areas or are remote and have simply been left alone," said Dan Whittle, senior attorney at the Environmental Defense Fund.

"Ernest Hemingway set up a fish camp on Cayo Paraiso (about 90 miles (145 km) west of Havana) in the 1940s and the area has not really changed since then. If he were still alive, he'd still recognize it today," he said of the U.S. writer who lived in Cuba for two decades.

COAST IN DANGER

Cuba's northwest coast is considered most in danger from the oil. It is there that coral reefs, seagrass beds and mangroves provide major breeding grounds for many fish and sea creatures, including endangered migratory species like sea turtles, sharks and manatees, Whittle said.

All that is at stake if the BP oil finds its way to Cuba. It could also damage Cuba's tourism industry, which is centered on beaches and to a lesser degree eco-tourism.

Tourism brought in more than $2 billion to Cuba last year, or about 20 percent of Cuban's foreign exchange income.

The good news for Cuba is that the spill is still centered about 300 miles (483 km) northwest of the island and BP may finally be gaining control over the massive leak.

Officials for the oil giant said on Friday their so-called "top kill" solution of plugging the gusher by pumping in "drilling mud" was showing signs of success.

But even if that happens soon, Cuban officials are concerned that the oil already in the water could be swept south by gulf currents.

Cuba is separated from the Florida Keys by just 90 miles (145 km) of water and despite their disparate political histories, the United States and Cuba are inextricably linked ecologically.

Another rumor that supposedly contributed to the Cuban beach closures this week was that lionfish, which have venomous spikes and have invaded Cuban waters in recent years from Florida, were poisoning swimmers. The government said that rumor also was false.

The United States and Cuba have been at odds since Fidel Castro took power in a 1959 revolution, but they held talks last week about the oil slick, officials said.

Cuba expert Wayne Smith at the Center for International Policy think tank in Washington said he met with Cuban authorities this week in Havana and that they are "fully open" to cooperation with the Americans to stop the oil.

Standing in the way is the longstanding U.S. trade embargo against Cuba, which prevents the use of much U.S. technology in Cuba.

At a conference this week in Washington, oil experts and environmentalists said it was time to allow cooperation with Cuba in oil safety practices.

"We are not talking about a transfer of technology. All we are asking is that, if there is an accident, the Cubans can pick up the phone and call American experts who can bring resources within 24 hours," said oil expert Jorge Pinon.

The issue is becoming a bigger one as Spanish oil giant Repsol (REP.MC) (REP.N) prepares to drill for oil off Cuba's ecologically rich northwest coast perhaps later this year. It has contracted for use of an Italian-owned drilling rig now being completed in China.

While the spill is a disaster, it might have one positive result, Smith said.

"It actually could help improve (U.S.-Cuba) relations if we cooperate in the right way and we have the right attitude," he said.

Many people assume that being black is one of my daily concerns, as if that condition condemns me to always being a victim.

Each one of us has felt discrimination at some time in their life: for being fat, bald, homosexual, or very thin, for being left-handed or shy, elderly or a kid, for belonging to the female sex, or for being slow or very intelligent, for being Russian, Arab, Chinese or African. My goodness! – the list is long.

In Cuba, where black slaves were once brought, the issue remains touchy. The problem is that there always existed a thousand ways to humiliate, subjugate, control and relegate, as well as to subdue and sway blacks.

Some people here treat us with paternalism, which becomes annoying. And referring to us as "people of color," morenos (brown-skinned), prietos (blackish) or "the darkest," they continue to mark the difference.

It's worth mentioning that interracial discrimination also subsists and divides us. Some blacks react aggressively if you refer to them directly as "black" (which is the "color" of our race); they look at this as if you had intentionally "shit on their mother."*

Accepting ones blackness in an atmosphere that is discriminatory (though generally muted), in a country that formally declares itself non-discriminatory with regard to race, entails much practice and great effort at being a full "human being," above everything else. It means being aware of wanting to live this short life with whatever it brings for each living soul, and by this I'm referring to the consciousness and valuation of who I am from my inner self.

Therefore, among my people there are those who have already surpassed this obstacle, while others are at different points on the map of discrimination.

I have heard and seen how we as blacks coexist with this atmosphere. I've witnessed the defenses that are created that discriminate against the rest, such as:

- That's a black thing.

- People of our color have to help themselves.

- Black people are something else.

- (S)he's a black piolo (Uncle Tom).

- or ridiculing a white for certain things they do.

Likewise, there are discriminatory phrases toward others, such as:

- If a black person doesn't do it at the entrance, they'll do it at the exit.

- You didn't do so badly, for a black person.

- Need makes you give birth to mulatto children.*

Or notions of self-marginalization like:

- He/she thinks like white people (so they'll do better).

- Those are white people's things.

I think that if black Cubans subjected to discrimination would see the reality from the perspective of the observer who analyzes the pros and cons, the origin and the consequences of what holds us down; they would notice that what really paralyzes us is self-discrimination.

That need was created for us to compare ourselves with the others, but it was based on the very conditions that the others imposed.

Black people, genetically and socially, possess the same conditions here as everyone else to develop themselves. In addition, our being greater in numbers and our strength, opinions and social incidence should not be dismissed.

Pain doesn't allow us to look beyond, and the capacities possessed allows for seeking a place within integration. Though others insist on making us feel different but we have sufficient weapons to confront that.

I believe that discrimination against blacks in Cuba is something to leave to the minds of those who are not black or who don't consider themselves as such, and who suffer because the race exists.

* Referring to children born of black and white parents. Well! It seems that having sex with blacks is done out of necessity.

Posted on Saturday, 05.29.10How to restore hope on the islandBY JOSE AZELjazel@miami.edu

Cuba today may be described as ``an impossible country'' with unsustainable sociopolitical and economic arrangements. For Cuban people, over half a century of living under a totalitarian regime with a failed command economy means a legacy of economic, social, political and civil backwardness.

Unable to live from their legitimate labors, Cubans developed a survival ethic that justifies everything. It's a way of dealing with their lives' incoherence. Cuba's civil society has committed a sort of philosophical and ethical suicide to escape the existential absurdity of a future without possibilities. Cubans today do not venture to dream or hope, except perhaps about leaving the island.

As the Castro brothers' era comes to an end, we must acknowledge these adverse conditions. Cuba's way out of its existential distress is not just freedom from deplorable economic conditions. Cuba's potentialities will depend more on individual freedoms and empowerment than on a given set of economic reforms.

Freedom from fear must be the first step for a genuine and successful transition because it is a necessary condition to reversing political apathy. Any reform effort that leaves civil society inarticulate fails to recognize that no modern society can function in the best interests of the people without an effective system of checks and balances.

A transition or succession?

That will depend on whether Cubans embrace a governing philosophy that recognizes individual freedoms, a true transition, or a succession that advocates the primacy of economic measures even if undertaken outside the framework of democratic empowerment.

These alternate paths matter because the one chosen will crystallize the post-Castro narrative for generations to come. The healing of the Cuban nation cannot take place in a political vacuum; it cannot take place in a totalitarian setting, and it cannot take place without the civil liberties and political rights to practice heroic tolerance and political wisdom.

In order to avoid political stasis or chaos in post-Castro Cuba, a new way of perceiving the future and of behaving as a people must emerge. For this to happen the transitioning Cuban government cannot be an ideological extension of the Castro regime. It needs to be its antithesis.

Cuba's future will be contingent not just on economic conditions, but also on the individual decisions of the many.

This means that changes that do not beforehand place individual freedoms and empowerment front and center via pluralistic, free and fair elections would condemn Cuban society to live a provisional existence of unknown limit. This is a condition that wounds the human spirit and does not promote the development of democratic sociopolitical values.

Political rights and civil liberties are not superfluous luxuries to be appended to a program of economic reforms. They are essential to empower the citizenry to correct mistakes, voice discontent and bring about changes in leadership. Democracy requires a relationship model between the state and its citizens that is dramatically different from the model of a Marxist-Leninist state. Cuban Communism cannot be reformed to bring about a genuine transition.

To awaken aspirations -- to venture to dream and hope, to escape its daily Sisyphean tasks -- Cuban society must exorcise the mythology of the messianic maximum leader. This cannot take place within a regime of authoritarian continuity masquerading as a regime of change.

A successful transition in Cuba will require, perhaps above all else, a compelling vision of hope for all Cubans; an irrefutable realization that life can regain its potential meaning despite its tragic aspects. In post-Castro Cuba, choices will be made and paths will be taken. Let them be those of individual freedom and empowerment so that Cubans will be able to always feel free.

José Azel is a senior scholar at the Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies at the University of Miami and author of Mañana in Cuba.

There are people you talk to who are so inspiring, so full of life, so driven and so enthusiastic, that you feel the urge to drop everything and run to join them. Talking to Carmen Vallejo was just like that. Only I couldn't run to her. She lives in Cuba and I'm in New York, but we are separated, it turns out, only by water and distance.

Carmen and her husband Rey Febles, give love, joy and support to about 200 children and youngsters with cancer. With the help of foreign friends, Carmen and Rey throw birthday parties, celebrate Halloween, Christmas, and produce theater and musical shows for the entertainment of children some of whom are so sick that they have forgotten how to smile.

But soon enough they remember. Talk to Carmen for a while, or visit her website at desdecuba.com/carmenyrey and you will too. I found myself laughing with her when she told me a story of one of their youngsters, mutilated by cancer, who one day said, ``Today I woke up with my right foot,'' a translation of a Spanish saying that means everything is going right. ``Of course,'' the girl went on, ``I always do. My left leg is gone.''

I heard about Carmen and Rey through Luly Duke, whose New York-based foundation Amistad is one of the friends the Cuban couple depends on. Duke, who is Cuban American and whose maiden name is Alcebo Fundora left Cuba in 1960, when she was 14. In 1975 she married Anthony Drexel Duke, of the famed Duke family that made its original fortune on tobacco. Duke University is named for the family.

Needless to say, Luly Duke could live a life of luxury in the Hamptons, where she has a home, and belongs to groups such as the Garden Club of East Hamptons. But Duke has long had a humanitarian and activist streak. Many years ago, she joined her husband's work in The Harbor for Boys and Girls, Inc, a multiservice organization for inner-city children, which he founded.

In 1995, after 35 years in exile, Duke returned to Cuba and her life changed.

``I realized the people of Cuba needed help and I was in a position to help,'' she says simply.

And for some reason, Duke makes the very complicated, very political, very exhausting topic of Cuba sound new, simple and refreshing. Help is needed. We can give it. Why not do it?

Why not, indeed? The needs of the Cuban people are overwhelming: everything from toilet paper to food, coloring pencils, aspirin and underwear.

Duke has focused her funding on educational, cultural and medical needs -- three areas, where, by the way, the Cuban government boasts of excelling. But Duke doesn't discuss politics. To do what she does, she has managed to earn the trust and good will of both the U.S. and the Cuban governments and focus on her foundation's mission: to build bridges to Cuba. She has a license from the Treasury Department and maintains good relations with U.S. and Cuban officials.

In addition to donating more than 3,000 pounds of over-the-counter medicines and medical supplies for Carmen and Rey's kids, Fundación Amistad has, among other things, sent about 1,000 pounds of sports equipment, and, with partners, more than $90,000 in medical supplies and technical books to three medical centers in Havana.

Duke said she would like to see Carmen and Rey's work serve even more kids in other areas of Cuba, but the foundation, like others in these times of economic uncertainty, is hurting for funds. To keep afloat, they need to raise $45,000 before the end of the year.

Carmen, who is deeply religious, said she and her husband started the program after Mother Teresa visited Cuba in 1988 and asked her to take care of children with cancer. Carmen was serving as her translator during the visit.

She said her group is ``tolerated'' by the Cuban authorities, who don't like the fact that she takes the children wherever they are invited, be it the home of a foreign western ambassador or a meeting with Eusebio Leal, Havana's historian.

``What we do is beyond politics, religion and race,'' Carmen said. ``We just want to ease the very real pain of these kids and see them smile.''

Duke has the same approach. She has already established the bridge. Others can walk with her or build their own.

Friday, May 28, 2010

Cuban Protestors Thank Church for MediationWives Hoping for Release of Political Prisoners

HAVANA, Cuba, MAY 27, 2010 (Zenit.org).- "We still have a lot of hope," says Laura Pollán when she speaks of the possible release of political prisoners in Cuba. Her own husband, Héctor Maseda, is completing a 20-year sentence.

Pollán is the spokeswoman for a group of Cuban protestors -- mostly wives and mothers of political prisoners, known as the "Ladies in White" -- whose cause is being presented to the government through the mediation of the Church.

They are the only public protestors known to have been permitted by authorities since the '60s, though the Church last month was already instrumental in protecting them from a government threat to prohibit their Sunday marches.

After their march last Sunday, the Ladies in White affirmed their hopes for a step by step release of political prisoners, and they thanked the Church for its help.

"We still have a lot of hope, the conversations are moving ahead [...] we have a lot of faith that soon, there will be good news," Pollán said.

Moving forward

The spokeswoman reported that Saturday they had a "very good three-hour meeting" with the archbishop of Havana, Cardinal Jaime Ortega y Alamino, and one of his auxiliaries, Bishop Juan de Dios Hernández.

"They told us that soon there will be surprises," she said. "There are discussions under way (with the government) about the issue of the prisoners, the relocation (of prisoners) and the issue of (Guillermo) Fariñas."

Fariñas is a journalist who three months ago began a hunger strike in protest at the death of a fellow dissident. He is seeking the release of 26 more political prisoners who are said to be seriously ill.

President Raúl Castro and Cardinal Ortega met last week for more than five hours, and the cardinal advocated the release of the political prisoners. Human rights groups calculate there are some 200 of these prisoners in Cuba.

Fariñas told the Mexican news agency Notimex that Auxiliary Bishop Hernández visited him in his hospital room in Santa Clara and told him of the government decision.

Pollán affirmed, however, that the prelates reminded her that it will be step by step. "We can't bound up the whole staircase in one leap," she said, "we'll go step by step."

The Ladies in White spokeswoman said she was unaware of a date for the measures Fariñas is expecting.

In process

Reiterating that the process would develop in small steps, she said that "we cannot think like some people who have the hope that they are going to suddenly open the gates, and everyone is going to come out all at once. No."

Pollán added that the Ladies in White have asked for direct meetings with the government, with the Church acting as mediator in the meetings.

"But it looks like this won't happen," she said. "It seems that they will talk to the Church, the Church will report it to us, and we will talk with the Church about what we agree with [and] what we keep asking."

The Ladies in White had their first meeting with Church leadership on May 1, with the participation of Cardinal Ortega; they met again May 15 with Monsignors Ramón Suárez Polcari and José Félix Pérez; and in the most recent meeting, Cardinal Ortega again attended.

HAVANA TIMES, May 27 – The removal of Cuban Transportation Minister Jorge Luis Sierra was a surprise to me given that his ministry was one of the few sectors in which one can say the country has advanced ostensibly, both at the urban and the inter-provincial levels.

I wondered what the errors were that Sierra made, so I began looking for information among government officials. When they told me the reason, I found it so difficult to believe that I continued looking for additional sources to confirm what was said.

It seems that the sin committed by the former minister was authorizing the importation of automobiles without payment of taxes by those Cubans who had had an old vehicle to offer in exchange and who also have enough money to buy a new one abroad.

I was familiar with that measure and I found it an intelligent way of renovating the nation's automotive inventory without investments on the part of the government. However, things went beyond what was foreseen by the transportation authorities.

Most of the automobiles bought by Cubans were deluxe: late model Mercedes Benz, Audis and BMWs. Some artists bought vehicles valued at more than $50,000 (USD). However, there were also State employees —with monthly wages of $30 (USD) — who were importing $15,000 vehicles.

Immediately, all the alarms sounded and imports were suspended exactly when those who had the least money were prepared to get new cars. The wealthiest don't have anything to worry about; their deluxe cars already distinguish them.

I could speak hours of anecdotes of this case and of Cuban idiosyncrasy, but what's certain is that the problem is much greater at the roots; it exists in the mechanisms created by the system in relation to automobiles.

Typically, for a citizen to buy a vehicle they needed permission from the vice-president of the country. I don't know who authorizes it now but for years it was the job of VP Carlos Lage to decide who deserved a car.

Theoretically, as has often been said, the sale of automobiles should be oriented toward those who need one to carry out socially beneficial labor. Authorities affirmed that the ecosystem would collapse if all inhabitants of the planet had their own vehicle.

However, later these same authorities reward citizens with automobiles. During the good years, cars were sold for a highly subsidized price to outstanding workers and more recently they have been given out to retired athletes.

In Cuba, a vehicle is the Premio Gordo (the Grand Prize). I have an acquaintance who —due to his technical contributions during the economic crisis of the 1990s— received a motorcycle. The following year he came up with additional new inventions so he was awarded another motorbike; and as he continued to stand out, in this millennium he was allowed to buy a car, a Russian Lada.

No one asked this outstanding Cuban technician if he needed a house, a pay raise or if he wanted to take a trip. No, he deserved a grand incentive – and these are vehicles. Consequently, this gentleman will have to decide between enlarging his garage and ceasing to invent things.

Absurdities and Exceptions

The absurdity is such that to prevent the rewarded from reselling their cars to third parties, who don't "deserve" them, there exists a guideline that prohibits these sales by owners, although this is a regulation that Cuban law itself authorizes.

To complicate things even more, there are exceptions. Sailors, artists or diplomats can buy automobiles whenever they can justify their income. However, farmers are not allowed to do the same, even when they can prove that the money they accumulated was the product of their labor.

What's more, we're not talking solely about automobiles; farmers cannot buy trucks or tractors. I know of a case of someone who was given a tractor when he was abroad, but Cuban authorities denied him the right to import it onto the island.

As foreigners do have the right to buy vehicles, some Cubans will offer them money to buy a car in the non-native's name. An islander might invest thousands of dollars knowing that when the legal owner returns to their country, the car can no longer be driven.

The resulting chaos has become a fertile soil for the black market, where every year automobiles are sold by taking advantage of gaps in the law and by bending the rules with money (discreetly putting cash in the hands of corrupt officials).

The relationship between Cuban authorities and automotive vehicles is strange, almost traumatic. They have transformed the automobile into the citizen's greatest material aspiration, which someone can only access after accumulating high merit.

President Raul Castro already eliminated some of the prohibitions that weighed on the citizenry —access to hotels, cell phones, the Internet— and the universe remained intact. Equally, an opening in terms of the sale of cars would only affect the bureaucracy, the black market and corruption.

TAMPA - There is a new push to make Tampa a gateway to Cuba, including direct flights from here to Havana, in an effort to connect Tampa's economical future with its historical past.

The vision is to have at least two non-stop flights each day to Havana, totaling more than 8,000 passengers a month, and open the Port of Tampa to shipping trade with Cuba.

"That will create jobs, and it will also help to break down some of those old barriers that need to be broken down in a peaceful way," said Stephen Michelini with the World Trade Center.

Backers of Cuba trade asked the Tampa City Council to visit the island nation on a cultural and trade mission. They found a ally in councilwoman Linda Saul-Sena.

"It's for our economic future, as well as our cultural, social, and economic heritage," Saul-Sena said.

A hundred years ago, Florida cattle were driven across the state to steamships in Tampa, bound for Cuba. Then came the famous Tampa cigar factories staffed by Cuban immigrants. The rise of Fidel Castro, however, led to the U.S. embargo that severed much of Tampa's historical Cuban connection.

The port of Houston recently got authorization to expand its trade with Cuba, and backers of the Tampa-Cuba connection say now is the time to reopen trade here.

Some agricultural trade is allowed under the embargo, and backers say Tampa needs to catch up.

The City Council voted to organize with the County Commission and the Aviation and Port Authorities to steer Tampa back to its longtime Cuban ties.

There are currently several bills in the United States Congress aimed at easing the embargo, but many Cuban exiles, especially in South Florida, are still opposed to lifting it.

Thursday, May 27, 2010

To illustrate a story about the presentation to Fidel Castro this week of a medal from the Ecuadorean National Assembly, the official website Cubadebate on Wednesday used a photograph made last October during another such ceremony.The picture shows Ecuadorean Vice President Lenin Moreno Garcés giving Castro a medal for sending Cuban doctors to the Manuela Espejo Mission, which cares for the disabled in Ecuador. Others in the image are unidentified.The photograph was not published in Cuba by the national media at the time, though it was released to the international media by the Ecuadorean government.In it, Castro is seen leaning to accept the medal because Moreno is wheelchair-bound. He was shot in the back during a robbery attempt in 1998.–Renato Pérez Pizarro.

US Is $500 Million Supermarket to CubaPublished: Thursday, 27 May 2010 | 10:00 AM ETBy: Rob ReutemanSpecial to CNBC.comAP

The U.S. businesses that sold $528 million in food products to Cuba last year range from small dairy farmers to multi- billion dollar agribusiness corporations.

But they seem to have one thing in common: they admit to mixing a little social messaging in with their sales.

Take the case of Ralph Kaehler, a St. Charles, Minn., cattleman who shipped the first livestock to Cuba after the U.S. lifted its 52-year trade embargo to allow sales of food products and medical supplies in 2000.

In 2002, news photos of Kaehler's two sons were published around the world as they showed Fidel Castro one of their bulls, named Minnesota Red. (See one of the images below.)

"I'd rather have my boys someday go down there and negotiate a cattle contract than be members of a peacekeeping mission," Kaehler said. "We've never gone to war with a trading partner."

Kaehler is outspoken on the subject of doing business with Cuba, in sharp contrast to the rare and carefully chosen statements on the subject from agribusiness giants like Cargill or Archer Daniels Midland.

The Cuban trade embargo remains a hotly-debated topic of the sort most U.S. companies shy away from. You either believe that economic sanctions should remain in effect until the Cuban dictatorship switches to democracy or you believe that the quickest way to undermine the Cuban government would be to flood the island with U.S. goods and citizens.

Profit hasn't been foremost on Kaehler's list of motives.

"Like my banker says, for the amount of money we've gone through in trading with Cuba, we sure haven't kept much," he said. "We're doing it as much for correcting policy we think is wrong as anything else. And as farmers, we have to promote agriculture whenever we can."

Archer Daniels MidlandSeth Perlman / AP

Decatur, Ill.-based Archer Daniels Midland, with 2009 revenues of nearly $70 billion, was the first U.S. company to sign a contract with Cuba after the Trade Sanctions Reform and Export Enhancement Act of 2000 lifted part of the trade embargo.

By some estimates, ADM now accounts for nearly half of all U.S. food exports to Cuba. But the company doesn't publicize its Cuban trade.

Asked last week about ADM's trade with Cuba, media relations manager Roman Blahoski responded, "We generally do not discuss market conditions. We do not break down revenue by country or region, only by business unit—corn processing, etc.,—so we wouldn't have any revenue information specific to Cuba to provide."

But last year, Tony DeLio, a former vice-president of marketing and public relations at ADM, was quoted by the Minneapolis Star-Tribune: "We are always concerned when there is a lack of freedom. But as a company, our ability to affect that, and where we can help bring about change, is through trade."

Cargill Inc., one of the world's largest privately owned corporations, also has been doing business with Cuba for 10 years. Since it's privately held, Cargill is not required to file public reports on its financial profile, but its annual sales are estimated at well over $55 billion.

Asked this week about its trade with Cuba, media relations director David Feider responded by e-mail: "I can confirm that Cargill has sold U.S. agricultural commodities now for a number of years—corn, dried distillers' grains, wheat—licensed by the U.S. government under the Trade Sanctions Reform & Export Enhancement Act of 2000 into Cuba."

"This activity is consistent with our longstanding belief that that food is a basic right, and access to it should not be manipulated by governments for political purposes," Feider added.

Florida International University, which annually polls Cuban-American sentiment, identified a tipping point in 2008. For the first time less than half of respondents, 45 percent, supported the continuing U.S. economic embargo. Their 2004 poll showed that 66 percent wanted the embargo to continue.

"The embargo is about the Cuban exiles who backed Batista," Kaehler said. "It's all about old money and old power. Over 70 percent of Cuban Americans weren't alive when the embargo was put in place. All families in Cuba have relatives in the U.S. Just like Mexican families, they all have someone up here making money and sending it home. Even with the embargo and all its impeding circumstances, we're still one of Cuba's top four trading partners."

The U.S. food products now making their way to Cuba include corn from Iowa, cattle from Florida, millions of dozens of eggs from Massachusetts, rice from Texas and apples from Washington state. American coffee, shellfish, bread, wine, cigarettes and pistachios also are exported.

More than 30 states have sent trade missions to Cuba in the past 10 years, eager to do business with an island country of 11.4 million people that has to import 70 percent of its food.

"The more you learn about the embargo, the crazier it gets that we're continuing it," Kaehler said. "The logic of it defies a normal mind.""

HAVANA TIMES, May 27 – The danger of an outbreak of a dengue epidemic persists in Santiago de Cuba, the second most important city in the island, due to the high indices of infestation of the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which transmits that and other diseases, reported the local press. The authorities have mobilized equipment to eliminate the insect's breeding centres while urging social organizations to join in the eradication campaign, reported IPS.

HAVANA -- Cuba has yet to open a legal case against a U.S. government contractor from Maryland nearly six months after he was arrested as a suspected spy, the head of the island's high court said Wednesday.

Alan P. Gross was detained Dec. 3 at Havana's Jose Marti International Airport and has been held without charge at the capital's high-security Villa Marista prison ever since.

Formal charges cannot be filed in Cuba without a judicial accusation and the opening of a court case, so it appears unlikely charges against Gross are imminent even as he approaches a half-year in custody.

It is rare for suspects to be held for extended periods in Cuba without charges or even a case being opened. But Supreme Court President Ruben Remigio said Wednesday that "there still is not a case related to this matter" and he did not know whether prosecutors were working on one.

"The courts receive cases when cases are presented," Remigio added, speaking on the sidelines of an international legal conference in western Havana. "When they aren't presented, we don't have a case."

The general in charge of investigations for the Interior Ministry attended the same event but declined to comment.

Gross, a 60-year-old native of Potomac, Maryland, came to Cuba as part of a little-known program funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development.

President Raul Castro and the speaker of Cuba's parliament allege Gross was distributing banned satellite communications equipment and say his capture proves Washington is still out to topple their communist government.

The U.S. State Department has countered for months that Gross is no spy and should be released immediately.

A Washington-based spokeswoman for his family said they had no comment Wednesday. Gross' wife, Judy, previously said he is a veteran development worker who was helping Cuba's Jewish community use the Internet to communicate among themselves and with similar groups abroad.

She says her husband brought communications equipment intended for humanitarian purposes, not for use by Cuba's small dissident community.

Satellite phones and other telecommunications materials are outlawed in this country, where the government maintains strict control over Internet access and the media.

Officials from the U.S. Interest Section, which Washington maintains in Havana instead of an embassy, have been granted three consular visits to see Gross in prison, but have been otherwise largely silent on the matter.

Cheryl Mills, chief of staff to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, raised the case in March during a meeting with Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez during a U.N. conference on aid for Haiti.

Also pressing for Gross' release was Craig Kelly, deputy assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, who became the highest-ranking U.S. official to visit Cuba in years when he came here for immigration talks in February.

WASHINGTON -- The American Hotel & Lodging Association spent $305,000 in the first quarter lobbying federal officials on travel to Cuba, labor and other issues, according to a recent disclosure report.

That's less than the $350,000 the group spent lobbying both in the same period last year and in 2009's fourth quarter.

The trade group, which represents hotel companies, also lobbied the federal government on family medical leave and health insurance for small businesses in January through March.

The trade group lobbied both houses of Congress and the Departments of Labor, Commerce and Homeland Security, according to a disclosure report it filed April 19 with the House clerk's office.

HOUSTON — The Port of Houston has reached an agreement to ship directly to Cuba, opening the door for more jobs and even a thriving cruise-line business.

"Our dream scenario is that we would end up in the cruise business with Cuba," said Jim Edmonds, chairman of the Port of Houston Authority. "I think that would be a popular destination."

The partnership has the potential to bring thousands of jobs to the Houston area, port officials said. Already the nation's largest petrochemical complex, the Port of Houston directly and indirectly impacts 785,000 jobs in Texas.

The U.S. Commerce Department recently – and quietly – approved a shipping contract for a company looking to transport goods directly between Houston and the island nation. It marks another step in the process of the Obama administration thawing relations with the communist country.

A series of embargoes have strictly limited trade with Cuba since 1962.

But in 2009, U.S. trade with the island located just 90 miles off the Florida Keys was estimated at more than $500 million.

Texas wants a bigger piece of that. Right now, the Lone Star State is a distant second behind Louisiana in exports to Cuba.

A previous policy prohibited container cargo from being shipped to Cuba by any state besides Florida. Moving the cargo to Florida was proving cost-prohibitive for many companies, so port officials have been actively lobbying Congress and the Obama administration to ease trade restrictions.

Edmonds said Cuba is very interested in importing goods from Texas, including grain, poultry, and flour. Port officials are also looking forward to the ability to ship steel to rehabilitate the country's crumbling infrastructure.

Still, there are critics that wonder whether the U.S. should be doing business with a communist country.

"We trade with communist nations all the time," Edmonds said. "I look at this as a trade opportunity, not politics."

Posted on Wednesday, 05.26.10CUBA | ANALYSISIs Raul Castro taking risk in church talks?Raúl Castro's negotiations with the Catholic Church have sparked hope, but recognizing the church as a mediator is uncharted territory.BY JUAN O. TAMAYOjtamayo@ElNuevoHerald.com

Raúl Castro's talks with the Catholic Church on political prisoners have sparked hopes, skepticism and assertions he's taking a risk by recognizing the church as a mediator in Cuban affairs.

The meetings with Cardinal Jaime Ortega are the first time in memory the communist government has negotiated with a national, independent organization like the Cuban church, on an island where authorities try to control virtually all activity.

They also represent Castro's most important political shift since succeeding his ailing brother, Fidel, two years ago. The meetings also have given added weight to a church that the state has kept on a short leash throughout most of the past five decades.

Castro has promised to move some political prisoners in poor health to hospitals, move other jailed dissidents to institutions closer to their homes and eventually release some of Cuba's estimated 190 prisoners of conscience.

`A MIDDLEMAN'

While the local church has long decried Cuba's problems, ``what is new is the government's readiness to publicly recognize the Cuban Catholic church as a middleman for resolving key issues,'' Havana dissident Oscar Espinosa Chepe wrote in a column Monday.

Fidel Castro freed 3,600 political prisoners after 1978 negotiations with exiles, and about 300 dissidents and common criminals after Pope John Paul II's 1998 visit to Cuba. He also released a few to visitors such as the Rev. Jesse Jackson and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson.

Now his brother's meetings with Ortega have raised hopes for an improvement in Cuba's human rights record, too. But there also have been accusations that the cardinal is being manipulated by Raúl Castro to give a propaganda boost to what may amount to meager changes for political prisoners.

Some analysts are also cautioning that Castro is taking a risk because his talks with Ortega may put his government on the slippery slope of political concessions and embolden dissidents, average Cubans and even government officials critical of his slow pace in adopting economic reforms.

``The government is tacitly recognizing with this gesture that it will definitively accept the risks of thinking differently,'' said Julio Hernandez, a Miami supporter of dissident Oswaldo Payá's Christian Liberation Movement.

``When the authorities recognize any sort of independent source of power, they are admitting a weakness,'' said a Havana author who asked to remain anonymous to avoid possible retaliations for his comment.

Phil Peters, a Cuba analyst at the Lexington Institute think tank in suburban Washington, noted that Havana in the past has gone over the heads of local church officials and negotiated directly with the Vatican on issues such as permission to open new seminaries.

`A NEW SPACE'

The Castro-Ortega talks, he added, ``mark the government accepting the church as a part of civil society. . . . I don't particularly see any risk [for Castro] in it, but it is opening up a new space for political discussions on topics that were not open before.''

Brian Latell, a retired CIA Cuba expert, noted that the church-state talks come at a time when Castro faces a crushing economic crisis as well as a wave of international condemnation for Cuba's human rights record. On Raúl Castro's watch, jailed dissident Orlando Zapata died Feb. 22 after a hunger strike and there has also been a crackdown on the Ladies in White protesters.

But Latell added that Ortega was unlikely to push too hard during the conversations with Castro.

Espinosa Chepe, one of the 75 dissidents jailed in the 2003 roundup known as the Black Spring but freed for health reasons, said Castro's readiness to ease conditions for political prisoners could help improve Cuba's relations with Washington and the European Union.

``It's clear that President Obama favors better relations with Cuba . . . but he has been blocked by the lack of reciprocity,'' he wrote. If some political prisoners are freed, ``that could make it easier for the administration to take additional steps.''

In Washington, a State Department spokesperson said Monday: ``We've seen the optimistic prognosis [for the political prisoners] and are looking forward to seeing what concrete steps the Cuban government will take. We have urged the Cuban government before to release its prisoners of conscience.''

HAVANA, Cuba, MAY 25, 2010 (Zenit.org).- In a historic meeting, representatives of the Catholic Church in Cuba spoke with President Raul Castro about the release of political prisoners, among other items.

The archbishop of Havana, Cardinal Jaime Ortega y Alamino, gave a press conference on Thursday in which he reported on the meeting with President Castro, the first of its kind since Raul replaced his brother Fidel as head of the Cuban government.

The conclusions of the Wednesday meeting, regarded as positive by the Church leaders, point to the eventual release of political prisoners.

Cardinal Ortega y Alamino attended the meeting along with the president of the Cuban bishops' conference, Archbishop Dionisio García Ibáñez of Santiago de Cuba. President Castro was present along with Caridad Diego Bello, head of the Religious Affairs Office of the Central Committee of the Cuban Communist Party.

At the press conference, which took place in the archbishopric of Havana, Cardinal Ortega y Alamino "specified that this meeting cannot be seen from a point of view of compromises, but of conversations that had a magnificent beginning, and which must continue," reported a communiqué on the archdiocesan Web page.

The prelate told representatives of the national press and the international media accredited in Cuba that "matters were addressed of a national character, such as the Ladies in White and political prisoners, conscientious objectors (or counter-revolutionaries, as they are called by the Cuban government), the latter seen in their totality and not just the sick."

He added that no concrete conclusions or dates were solidified, and thus there are no official announcements about the next steps regarding these prisoners, but the authorities are in the process of "addressing the subject."

The cardinal affirmed, "I can say that the subject is being treated seriously."

New paths

He noted that historically, the Catholic Church in Cuba distanced itself because of clashes and difficulties that everyone knows about, but, on this occasion the Wednesday meeting gave "support to the mediating endeavor of the Church and, at the same time, recognition of the role of the Church as interlocutor, which surmounts the old grievances to walk on new paths."

In this regard, Cardinal Ortega y Alamino explained that the meeting was not seen in any way in terms of a Church-State relationship as "strategic alliance," as this phrase is of military or political perspective.

Rather, he said, the Church must act in society, starting from the value for religious liberty guaranteed by the constitution, but never under any type of alliance.

Hence, the prelate said, this meeting was important, as it surmounted old concepts to enter into what is the nature more proper to the Church and its mission in society.

He pointed out that as part of the mediating endeavor of the Church, on two occasions, two priests, Monsignor Ramon Suarez Polcari and Monsignor Jose Felix Perez, visited Guillermo Fariñas, who went on a hunger strike on Feb. 26 to appeal for the release of 26 prisoners of conscience who are ill.

They did not go to request that Fariñas discontinue his hunger strike, the cardinal said, but that, in a more human and religious vein, he would have more confidence in the Church's efforts -- in the sense that some of the things he is requesting might be obtained, while recognizing that in him there is a very respectable position in the order of his conscience, which might be made more flexible by these dialogues, given that a human life is at risk.

Plans for the future

Cardinal Ortega y Alamino highlighted the novelty of the conversation held with the Cuban authorities in the most positive sense of the term, as it "opens a new period," above all if one takes into account that the meeting was not to talk about the problems of the Church, but to talk about Cuba, about the present moment and about the future. "And it was thus for more than four hours," he added.

Thus, Wednesday's conversations entered into "the framework of the usual conciliating and mediating position of the Catholic Church, in every age and country, aware that 'dialogue is the new name of peace,'" said the prelate, quoting Pope Paul VI.

"Unfolded in this climate of seeking peace through dialogue was the meeting held yesterday between the top representatives of the Cuban Catholic Church and President Raul Castro," concluded the communiqué.

Archbishop García Ibáñez spoke further to AFP about the question of political prisoners, noting that "we spoke about it and I believe that on both sides there is a willingness, a desire that this be resolved and we hope it will be."

"I believe it will be," he emphasized, noting that it will be "a process and a process must begin with small steps and those steps will be taken."

This meeting precedes the visit to Cuba of the Vatican secretary for relations with states, Archbishop Dominique Mamberti, which is planned for June 15-20, on the occasion of the 10th Catholic Social Week.

During his sojourn in Cuba he will meet with the authorities of Castro's government and preside over ceremonies for the celebration of the 75th anniversary of relations between the Holy See and that nation.

Relations between the Vatican and the Castro regime improved after John Paul II's visit to Cuba in 1998, when he held an historic meeting with the now former head of state, Fidel Castro.

Cuba Reports Rabbit Hemorrhagic Disease OutbreaksCuba has reported to the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) two outbreaks of rabbit hemorrhagic disease.

Rabbit hemorrhagic disease (RHD) is an extremely contagious and fatal viral disease of domesticated and wild rabbits belonging to the Oryctolagus cuniculus species, according to OIE. Outbreaks have been reported at farms in Baragua and Venezuela. Both municipalities are located in Cuba's Ciego de Avila province.

The first confirmation of the disease occurred on May 18. The outbreaks are still recorded as unresolved, according to OIE. Weekly follow-up reports will be submitted.

The last outbreak of rabbit hemorrhagic disease reported in Cuba was in August 2005. According to OIE, the disease has always been confined to Cuba's western provinces, but the recent occurrence has taken place in a province in the central-eastern region of the country.

A disease emergency has been declared in the region and the neighboring areas. A disease alert has been declared for the entire country. The use of vaccines for protecting populations at risk is not to be precluded.

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

HAVANA TIMES, May 25 — An earthquake of 3.0 degrees on the Richter scale shook several areas of Cuba's eastern region on Monday night, reported the Network of Stations of the National Seismological Service. The quake, the 28th registered this year in the island, did not cause material damage in the towns where it was felt, reported IPS.

Monday, May 24, 2010

Raúl Castro, Cuba's president, has suggested that the Roman Catholic Church might play a larger role in solving the communist-run island's ills and perhaps lead to the release of political prisoners.

Experts and diplomats judged Mr Castro's move his most significant political act since replacing brother Fidel in early 2008.

Mr Castro held a four-hour meeting with Cardinal Jaime Ortega and Bishop Dionisio Garcia of Santiago de Cuba, the head of the Conference of Bishops. Cardinal Ortega said the meeting was a "magnificent beginning of an ongoing process . . . a recognition of the role of the Church as an interlocutor, of overcoming the old grievances".

Mr Ortega and Mr Garcia said the plight of political prisoners, of which there are about 60 according to Amnesty International, was discussed with Mr Castro and they were optimistic about the future.

Wind Power Increase on CubaCUBA - The Gibara II wind farm in Cuba has connected up four of its six wind turbines.

The wind farm has six wind Chinese designed Goldwind S-50 turbines, each of which can produce 750 kilowatts.

Cuba is looking to capitalise on a potential wind power of 2000MW to offset the import of 2,220 tonnes of petroleum into the country according to a report on Reve. The current installed capacity is just 7.2MW.

Gibara II wind farm is situated near the lighthouse at Punta Rosa, 1.5 mile from the city of Gibara, Holguin province, 350 miles east of Havana.

Cuba has three wind farms - the largest one is Gibara I built in 2008 with 5.1MW of capacity. The other two wind farms are located in the Isle of Youth, south-western Cuba, and in Turiguano in the central province of Ciego de Avila.

According to a wind map that has been compiled by the Cuban authorities, there are 32 suitable locations for the wind parks development on Cuba.

HAVANA, Cuba (ACN) -- A Russian ship is unloading at the Cuban city port of Cienfuegos a wheat cargo that completes the 75 000 tons which is part of a 100 000 donation made to Cuba.

Granma newspaper points out that this free shipments show the solidarity of the Russian Federation to the Cuban people.

Previously, a 22 500 tons of Russian wheat donation had been made at the beginning of 2009, and afterwards the two governments signed a cooperation agreement in the wake of Hurricanes Gustav, Ike and Paloma in 2008 where the Russians committed to supply these 100 000.

A fourth ship is already on its way to Cuba to complete the agreement, a example of the friendly relations between Cuba and the Russian Federation.

HAVANA — The government has agreed to move many of the 200 political prisoners to jails closer to their homes and will give medical attention to ailing prisoners, a church official told The Associated Press on Sunday.

The government's decision comes a few days after a rare meeting between President Raul Castro and two church leaders, including Cuban Cardinal Jaime Ortega.